


Something You Could Do

by MagusLibera



Series: fics I wrote in quarantine as I chilled [11]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Road Trip, Alternate Universe - Rock Band, F/M, Falling In Love, I will eventually continue this, Quarantine and Chill Fic Drive (Arrow TV 2012), Road Trips, Strangers, Strangers to Lovers, Wrong number
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-16
Updated: 2020-04-16
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:35:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23690053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagusLibera/pseuds/MagusLibera
Summary: Trying to get home before she gets stuck in Gotham indefinitely, Felicity calls a car hire service. Only she gets the wrong number and ends up talking to a man with the sexiest voice she has ever heard, who happens to also be in Gotham and also be heading to Starling.Well, since she has no other options...
Relationships: Oliver Queen/Felicity Smoak
Series: fics I wrote in quarantine as I chilled [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1672840
Comments: 77
Kudos: 186
Collections: Quarantine and Chill Fic Drive 2020





	Something You Could Do

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I hope you're all healthy and safe and if at all possible, indoors and quarantining.
> 
> I wrote another one, I'll let you get straight to it.
> 
> Yes, I am very happy with the word count.

Felicity will be the first to admit that she is a little desperate. But she knows that she cannot be the only one. The entire country must be a bit desperate right now. Because she knows that she cannot be the only person who is away from home – away from her state – right now. There must be others.

Three hours ago, the government announced that all flights, all trains, all buses and all transport would be cancelled from midnight onwards to anybody without special permission to use them. They gave the entire country fourteen hours to catch a final transport home. And Felicity was in a meeting with Bruce Wayne and the other Wayne Industries bigwigs at the time.

When she had finally left the conference room and checked her phone, she had been greeted by dozens of messages. Ones from her mother, her assistant Jerry, her friend Lyla. Everybody she knows seems to have messaged her, trying to find out how she is getting home.

She wastes no time in answering them, knowing that every second wasted is a second that might lead to her losing out on a chance to get home and speaking to her mother will certainly take up _a lot_ of seconds. Her heart stops seconds later when she sees that all flights out of Gotham have been fully booked. In just three hours, every single ticket has vanished. She tries to calm herself. There are other options. There are other ways. She is not just going to be _stranded_ in Gotham with nowhere to go. That would be ridiculous.

Trains, booked. Buses, booked. _Everything_ is booked. She actually _is_ stranded in Gotham. For real. Unless she is planning to walk the nearly three thousand miles from Gotham to Starling, she is stuck.

Panicked, she shoots a text to her mom, letting her know that she will call soon as she makes her way back to the hotel. The hotel that she only has booked for the next night. The hotel that, she realises, is also closing up. _What is she going to do?_ She feels like a mess for the entire time that she packs up her bags, needing to be ready at the nearest available opportunity to get home before she has no other choice but to find somewhere to stay in Gotham. Her phone keeps buzzing with messages from her mom, trying to find out what is happening but she is just not in a place where she can even begin to think about responding.

The only thing that she can think to do is to go to the reception of the hotel and beg for them to do something. Whether it is finding her a ride home or keeping the room available to her, she honestly does not care at this point, she just wants to know that she is going to have somewhere to go to wait this whole thing out.

Lucky for her, the people on the desk are lovely. They offer to take her in themselves if that is what it takes, but they also hand her a leaflet for a local car hire. Felicity cannot believe that she forgot about car hires, so preoccupied by everything happening that she had failed to stop and think for even a second. She is practically shaking as she types the numbers into her phone, knowing that this is her last bet before it is all over.

“Hello?” a gruff, slightly confused voice answers the phone, surprising Felicity. She had expected to hear the perky, preppy voice of a receptionist reciting the company’s answering policy, not the deep, sexy tones of a man who seems as flustered as she is.

“Hi!” she gasps, not even caring about the guy’s unprofessionalism. She is just happy that somebody answered. “Hi, I’m in Gotham on business but I don’t live here and I need to get home but the government just cancelled all of the flights and transport and all of it is booked up anyway before then and I really need to get a car so that I can get home to Starling. You wouldn’t happen to have any availabilities, would you?” she rushes out without stopping to think. Or breathe, for that matter.

“I’m sorry… what?” the voice sounds surprised.

“A car.” Felicity explains, confused as to why this man does not seem to know what she is asking for, “I need one.”

“Okay…” he replies, “And you called me… because?”

“To hire a car.” Felicity explains like she is talking to a three year old. “You hire out cars. I need a car. I thought this would be a good place to start.”

A huff of laughter buzzes through Felicity’s phone, and she feels her heart skip. She was unaware that she could be so attracted to a voice. “I don’t hire out cars.” He guffaws, “Either you’re the weirdest stalker I ever had or you’re a girl with the wrong number. Either way, I don’t think I’m the guy you were looking for.”

That is funny. Felicity was thinking the same thing a second ago.

Then his words sink in. Wrong number. She feels her cheeks begin to flame and knows that she is turning into the closest to a tomato that a human being can physically become. “Frack!” she cries out, before remembering that he can hear her too, “I am so, so sorry! I can’t believe I did that.” She pulls her phone back a bit to check the number. Sure enough, she tapped in one of the digits wrong, completely changing the phone number, “I’ll leave you in peace, I really am sorry about this. I’ll triple check before I press call next time, I promise.”

“Wait!” his cry stops her from hitting the end call button, “You know that the car hires are all going to be booked or closed, right?”

Felicity tries her hardest not to let the sob that wracks her at that thought be audible, “I have to try.” It is barely a whisper.

“Did you say you’re going to Starling? And that you’re in Gotham?” that husky voice asks, “I’m headed to Starling myself.” He pauses for a minute, “If you’re really not a stalker, I’ll drive you.”

It makes Felicity giggle, thinking that he is joking, “Wow, you’re really worried about stalkers aren’t you? Don’t you think that’s a little paranoid?”

“You would be surprised.”

“Oh, so you have experience with stalkers, do you?”

There is that little huff of air again, “You would be surprised.” He echoes his earlier words, “Let’s just say that you are far more likely to be the stalker in this scenario than I am.” Felicity would find that obnoxious, but she can tell that he is teasing her.

“Hmm,” she pretends to think, “Let’s see… I accidentally typed in a number wrong… you’re the one who just offered me, a complete stranger, a lift to Starling if I need it. Oh yeah, you’re right. _I’m_ totally the stalker in this scenario.” Are they… flirting?

“Touché” he laughs and Felicity thinks that she could so quickly grow addicted to that sound. “Well?” he prompts.

“Um, thank you so much for the offer, but you’re a random guy on my phone whose name I don’t even know, so if it’s all the same to you, I’ll try my luck.”

“It’s Oliver.”

“Oliver.” She breathes, “Hi, I’m Felicity.”

“Hi.” Did his voice get deeper? She needs to end this before she does or says anything certifiably insane.

“Um… if it’s all the same to you, Oliver, I’ll give that hire company a call now.”

“Of course.” He seems a little more alert now, “I hope you find your way home and if you can’t get a car, my offer still stands.”

“Thank you, Oliver. I hope you have a safe drive.”

“You too, Felicity.” She cuts off the call.

The hire service is shut. So is the next one, and the one after. The one after that is still open but not to new customers. The one after that is fully booked. There are no cars available _whatsoever_ in this city.

She slumps back in her chair, defeated. The recent call list on her phone blinks up at her like it is mocking her, just a long list of failures there for her to be reminded that she is still stuck and hopeless. One number, however, seems to be brighter than the others, almost like a calling card.

Against her better judgement, Felicity slides her finger down the screen. And she hits call.

*************************

“Hello?” his voice is just as intoxicating as before, she feels a shiver go through her, “Felicity? Is that you?” He said her name. _He said her name_ and it sounds _delicious_ in his rasping tones.

“How did you know it was me?” she asks, sounding far less smooth than he does.

He does the little chuckle that she is now realising is his signature laugh again, “I recognised your number from earlier.”

“Oh. Right. Of course.” She feels a little stupid, “So…”

She does not want to admit that she needs a lift from a complete stranger. A stranger with the sexiest voice she has ever heard, a stranger who she would like to see so that she can know if his voice matches the rest of him and a stranger who she thinks she would like to make laugh every single day just to hear that sound. But a stranger nonetheless.

“Let me guess,” he bails her out, “All of the hire services were either shut, shutting or booked and you can’t get home?”

“Well if you’re going to be like that, you might as well just go all in and say ‘I told you so’.” Felicity should be annoyed but instead she thinks that his smile may have infected her.

“Oh, okay. I told you so.” Felicity snorts in response, “So does that mean that you still need a lift back to Starling?”

With a sigh, she admits: “Yes. Is your offer still open?”

“For you? Always.”

“Thank you so much. You have no idea what a lifesaver you are. I thought I was going to end up with nowhere to stay in a strange city on the other side of the country.”

“Well I couldn’t let that happen now, could I?” he pauses for a beat, “So, I guess we should talk logistics.”

“Yes! Of course. I’ll just go along with whatever your plan is. I don’t want to be a problem, I’ll let you go about your business and I’ll figure out everything else and I’ll even take some driving shifts if you want me to.” She babbles, wanting him to know that she is not trying to control his journey. He is doing her a favour, she is not about to throw that back in his face. Unless he does turn out to be some sort of pervert.

“Well unless you have a bus driving license, I think you’d better leave the driving to me.” He says good naturedly.

“A bus?”

“Yeah, it’s a travel bus. I was… travelling with my ba- friends but we only managed to get three plane tickets so I got the short straw of driving the bus back.” He explains, “At least it’s kind of convenient. It’s going to take us three or four days to drive back and the bus has four beds and a toilet so we won’t have to worry about a hotel or anything.”

“Oh! That’s great. That’s… a real relief actually. The hotels are all shutting, so I was a little worried that you’d have like some tiny car that we barely fit in and we’d have to sleep there and get permanent back problems.”

“You might still get the back problems.” He laughs, “The beds are tiny and hard as nails.”

“It’s a good thing I’m short then, isn’t it?” Felicity jokes.

“That will definitely work in your favour. Um… so, I’m planning to leave in the next hour, if that’s good for you?”

“That’s perfect. The sooner the better.” She breathes a sigh of relief. She just wants to get home.

“Where are you staying? So that I can pick you up.”

“I’m at the Gotham Ritz-Carlton.” She blushes, not used to being able to afford such a luxurious place, but this is on her business account. For her business. That she started. That companies like Wayne and Palmer and Queen are already clamouring to work with.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“Um… no. I know it’s super pretentious and pricey but I’m not even paying for it, my company is and Mister Wayne insisted and I don’t normally stay in places like this but I thought I’d give it a go and-”

“No!” he cuts her babble off, a smile in his voice “I didn’t mean it like that. I just… I’m at the Gotham Ritz too.”

“What?”

“Yeah. Small world, right?”

“Yeah.” She says, thinking about how weird this whole situation is.

“So… I’ll pick you up in fifteen at the lobby?” he asks.

“Yeah, sure.” Small world indeed.

*************************

When Felicity walks down to the lobby fifteen minutes later, fresh off of calls to Lyla, Gerry and Donna – who panicked for half of their conversation about the thought of Felicity getting in a car with some stranger, and then suddenly asked how sexy his voice was, whether Felicity thinks that he looks as good as he sounds and then reminded her to ‘take advantage’ of the situation if she gets the chance – she realises that she has no way of knowing who Oliver is. All that she actually knows about him is that his name is Oliver, he has a phone and a hot voice and that he is going back to Starling. It drives home the stern points Lyla had made about trusting random men she has wrong-number-called. Not that she often calls the wrong number and decides to go on a days long road trip with whoever answers.

Fortunately for her, Oliver seems to have had the same thought. When she looks around the room, she sees a guy standing in the corner, a baseball cap firmly over his head and sunglasses covering his eyes as he holds a large, makeshift sign that reads ‘IS IT A SMALL WORLD FOR YOU TOO?’ in large font. It makes her smile, and she knows without a doubt that this is Oliver.

She drags her case over to him, “Hi. Oliver? I’m Felicity.” She sticks out a hand for him to shake, well trained as she is by her PR department.

“Felicity.” He gasps, barely audible as he pulls off the sunglasses and takes her hand, ”Hi.”

He is… beautiful. There is no other word for it. If she had been asked to draw her vision of the man on the other side of those phone calls, she could not have made anything as ruggedly sexy as the sharp blue eyed, scruffy jawed, chiselled man before her. And not just because her drawing skills are subpar at best.

“Hi.” She repeats taken aback. For a minute – or sixty, it is hard to tell – the two of them just stare at one another unmoving, taking each other in. Felicity is the first to shake herself out of it, “Uh… so, shall we get going?” she tries to blink back the dazed feeling she is experiencing.

It takes Oliver another moment to find his voice, “Yes. Good idea, yes.” Even though he already has his own bag in hand, he reaches over to take hers. A part of her wants to protest, the other part feels warm and fuzzy in a way that she is enjoying so much that she just lets herself sit back and relax as she watches him walk away.

She almost forgets to follow him,

*************************

The bus is less of a bus and more of a luxury travel home, really. Four beds, sleek, tinted windows with curtains, a little sitting area and kitchenette, televisions, a bathroom. The works. Felicity is in love with it from the moment that she steps inside, fully aware of how lucky she got to have called the wrong number and have ended up speaking to a guy so willing to help her out. She _really_ hopes that he is not about to try and kidnap her.

Before they set off, Oliver helps her get settled in, placing both of their things in their bunks as he tells her that she can have the ‘nice’ one. They all seem pretty nice to Felicity, for bunks on a bus at least, but she appreciates it nonetheless. He also checks that she has contacted all of her loved ones and has Find My Friends turned on, wanting her to know that she is safe with him as he tells her that he would want to know her location at all times if he were one of her loved ones. Those words give her some dangerous thoughts.

That first day is slightly awkward. It is not him that makes it awkward, she actually feels very safe and comfortable around him to an almost frightening level but she feels guilty for encroaching on his space and his journey, so wants to stay as quiet and unobtrusive as she can. She catches him looking back at her on several occasions, their eyes catching in the mirror but every time that she thinks he is going to speak up, he keeps his silence, so she just buries her head in a book again, only talking to him on two occasions, to offer him a coffee.

When he finally parks up, seven hours of solid driving later, the two of them quietly get ready for bed. The domesticity of it, of sharing a bathroom, of seeing their toiletries next to one another, of going to sleep separated by only a thin aisle, it makes her feel those same fuzzy feelings that she had when watching him carry her bags. She tries to bury that feeling as deep down as possible as she goes to sleep, very aware of his presence just behind her.

*************************

By the next morning, Oliver seems to have had enough of the silence. She wakes up to him, shirtless and in low slung joggers, making the two of them breakfast, coffee already brewing. She thinks that she might have imagined him. His abs are _unreal_. He is making her _coffee_. And _food_. He is too perfect to actually exist. It only takes a minute of them silently enjoying their first gulps of that life giving liquid for Oliver to clear his throat and start talking. He asks her about everything. Her life, her job, her friends – he seems particularly interested in Lyla – her family (he likes the sound of her mother far too much for Felicity’s liking), her hopes and dreams, why she was in Gotham. Everything. He is very interested in her job, and impressed, he even spurts out a gulp of coffee when she mentions that she is in talks with Queen Consolidated about a collaboration, which is the exact reaction that she had when they had approached her.

In turn, he tells her about his pushy mother, his dead father and his adorable baby sister who he is struggling to accept is grown up and now dating one of his friends. He tells her that he works with a band, to whom the bus belongs, and that he loves his job but that it can be very hard sometimes, especially when he is away from his sister for a long while. He talks about his friends, John, Sara and Roy who he has been travelling with, and Tommy who stayed back in Starling but who he grew up with. They talk all day, not always about themselves but they just talk and it is _wonderful_.

Felicity finds herself more and more interested in him as she realises that, behind the voice that could probably make her come without any outside influence, and the face and abs and body that would make anybody with so much as a passing attraction to men drool, there is an incredible man. A man that she wants to know everything about, and wants to experience everything with. When they finally stop for the night, they pull out some games and giggle their way through, growing closer and closer as they do until Felicity is leaning fully on him. She falls asleep like that, listening to his relaxing voice and only stirs once, when she feels him carry her to bed.

On the third day, Felicity wakes up to find Oliver’s gaze unwaveringly on her. She realises that her hand has migrated from the bed in her sleep and is reaching out to Oliver’s, which dwarfs hers. She blushes. Oliver gets up, saying nothing of it as he helps her out of the top bunk where she has been sleeping and Oliver tells her to get herself ready while he makes them breakfast. For the entire day, there is something between them. She feels closer to him than she had the day before, but their conversation is far slower. More stilted as the two of them experience some sort of electricity charging the air with every move that they make, every time that her arm brushes against his or their eyes meet.

That night, Oliver pulls out some wine, telling her that he had been saving it for their last night on the road together. It saddens Felicity to remember that this is it for them. They have each other’s numbers, but she cannot help but wonder if he will actually want anything to do with her after all of this is over and he no longer has to put up with her. She hopes he does. She really, _really_ likes him. But a big part of her is screaming that it is unlikely. That his friendliness is only because he does not want to spend these days in extreme awkwardness and that the things that she is feeling are purely one sided.

She is only a few sips in to what turns out to be an extremely delicious – and expensive – _Lafite Rothschild 1982_ when she looks over to where he is sat, barely an inch away from her and she meets his eyes. They are molten, dark, dizzying. Her breath hitches. Before she even knows what has happened, his lips are devouring hers and she is… she is a _mess_ beneath his touch. A quivering, melting mess. His hands are in her hair, carding through and angling her head further into his so that he can nibble on her lips, coax her mouth open and meet her tongue with his own. She grips tightly to the front of his shirt, pulling their bodies as close together as possible, feeling one of his hands leave her hair and slide down her body to cup her bum.

A surge of bravery overtakes her and she swings a leg over his, straddling his hips as she starts to grind down, feeling him pressing eagerly against her. He stands, still holding her with her legs wrapped around his hips and walks her over to her bunk, laying her down. “Are you sure?” he pants, lips plush and red from her teeth. She answers by tearing off her pyjamas and pulling him on top of her, mindless of the fact that he does not really fit in her tiny bunk, completely consumed by the feeling of him over her as they move together.

Their final morning is wonderful. She wakes up snuggled deep in his arms, both of them completely naked and happy. They make love again, slow and easy as the sun rises before they make a start. The entire day is full of soft touches and adoring looks and Oliver’s adorable complaints of back pain from being cramped in that bunk with her, right up until they go to get petrol.

While Oliver is filling up the tank, Felicity has a hunt for snacks. She goes to pay for everything and spots a flyer for the band _Arrow_. Felicity loves that band. She has never really looked into them or anything, but she remembers adoring their stuff, so she takes a closer look at the image of four guys and a girl in various poses.

She does a double take.

Is that… is that _Oliver_?

In the front, central to the whole image. She is desperate all over again as she looks up the – apparently extremely famous – band. How has Oliver kept this from her? Why did he not mention that he is not just working for the band, but that he is a _member_ of it? Was he trying to trick her somehow? Was he putting a buffer in between them, so that he could leave her as soon as they get back to Starling, never to look back?

Google comes up with its results. He is Oliver Queen, lead singer and guitarist for _Arrow_ , son of Robert and Moira Queen, _owners of Queen Consolidated._

And fiancé of Laurel Lance.

**Author's Note:**

> ...sorry.
> 
> Look, I actually didn't mean to end this one on a cliffie, okay? It was supposed to be a short one shot with a nice ending, but then all of a sudden it was 4k and in the perfect place to leave. There's at least one chapter left on this, and I will write it eventually. Let's be honest, there will probably end up being two more chapters. It's me, after all. (No! I will keep it to one, I will keep it to one, I will keep it to one...)
> 
> I'm on twitter [@MagusLibera](https://twitter.com/MagusLibera).


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